Online spreadsheet offers real-time election results in Loudoun

With election-night drama unfolding on Aug. 23 as a field of 10 candidates for state offices was reduced to four, at least one Loudoun County official spent a quiet evening at home. Bill McIntyre’s cell phone didn’t ring even once as election officials rolled out a new online spreadsheet that allowed the public to see precinct results tabulated in real time.

“I was watching it on my I-pad,” McIntyre, a division manager in Loudoun’s Department of Information Technology (DIT), said. “They didn’t call.”

Polls closed at 7 p.m. In the 10^th District race for Virginia House of Delegates, results were posted at 8:04 p.m., the drama ended, and friendly wagers called in.

Loudoun is a tech-savvy confluence of those whose business is IT commerce and those who use it for fun. This year for the first time, both watched in real time as election results appeared on an online spreadsheet adapted for a Google document.

Since the designers had left a chat window open, it was easy to see the public's reaction; they were pleased. They said so, their comments showing up online as “Anonymous” plus a randomly-assigned number.

Someone even chatted about one of McIntyre’s team, Chris Rossbach, crediting him for the spreadsheet as others commented how cool it was to watch polling numbers suddenly populate spreadsheet cells for every active Loudoun precinct. They probably would have mentioned team member Jakub Jedrzejczak if his name had fewer consonants or if they had known his nickname was just “Kuba.”

Google docs, which offers free software for uploading user-generated documents, replaced a human-powered spread sheet once filled in by hand on a chalkboard in the Board of Supervisors' board room as campaigners waited for the agony and ecstasy that separates winners and losers on election night.

For McIntyre, the hero in this primary was not a candidate, but Loudoun Electoral Board secretary Brandi Brookhouse, who partnered with Loudoun DIT to present election results on line in real time.

“For quite a few years, Loudon has presented election results as close to real-time as possible,” McIntyre said. “That was done by having them set up in the [supervisors] board room. Somebody with good penmanship would go up and write it in an old-fashioned spreadsheet.” 

Then the county modernized. A public information officer used a laptop entered precinct results and projected a Microsoft spread sheet, scrolling left or right to satisfy the curiosities of everyone in the room.

“We have for some time been wanting to take it to a near real-time environment and make it available on the web,” McIntyre said, “but the cost would have been too great. We would have had to write software to allow multiple people to view what is happening in an election as the information is put in. The cost, relative to benefit for the taxpayers’ money, was too high,” he said.

“We are always looking for services that are free, or hosted, that could be used by the registrar’s office to allow the public to view while the information was being added,” McIntyre said. “When Google advanced to the point where their system could easily accomplish all the needs,” he said, “we started making those recommendations.”

“We have been testing it out internally in small groups. That is how we built our expertise, the same way we built it in Microsoft Office 365. Google was just a little bit more advanced and offered the ability to view a spreadsheet while it was being edited. That isn’t offered yet by MS,” he said.

This year, the board room was unavailable in late August for the public dissemination of election results. McIntyre’s team “partnered with Brandi Brookhouse of the general registrar and converted the existing Excel spreadsheet to an online, real-time Google doc” that was quietly announced in press releases and linked from the Electoral Board’s web site, where one click took viewers instantly to the spread sheet to wait for results to be phoned in, and watch as they were typed into cells. The chat window was a bonus feature quickly endorsed by anonymous users.

Even when there was a glitch, McIntyre’s phone didn’t ring. With both Rossbach and “Kuba” away on leave, he said, “I was the backup if needed. They had my cell phone. But they took on the challenge. They didn’t call.”

“They had this little formula problem,” McIntyre said. “But the system is so simple that they never even thought to call DIT; they fixed it themselves. They said this was so easy they could handle it. That is a beautiful thing for technology,” McIntyre said. “When it is simple and powerful, and users can use it and the public can use it without training, it is an efficient government.”

“The general registrar’s office did such a great job being receptive and open to this: something new and different that we weren’t familiar with anyone else ever doing.

They implemented it very, very, well,” McIntyre said. “They are still committed to it and our plan is to use it in the other elections this year.”

The State Board of Elections also posted results online. Since some Loudoun races included precincts from other counties, political junkies had to open another window to view full results for particular races. Though the state's site went down once, Loudoun results were still complete by 8:30 p.m. Tuesday.